Email Marketing Lesson from G.I. Joe

Way back during the 1980's cartoon series, who would have thought G.I. Joe to be a top-notch prognosticator of email marketing!  Quite likely, nobody...because email did not yet exist.  In any case, we digress.

G.I. Joe's famous line, "...and knowing is half the battle," is so true for today's email marketers.

When it comes to email, "knowing" the impact of your emails is vital to making continual improvements and crafting more effective messages for your customers.

Here are four tactics you can implement to "know more" about your email marketing effectiveness.

1. Link Append
"Link Append" simply means adding a unique ID, or code, to URLs that lead from your email messages back to your website.  Here is one example:

Regular URL:
http://www.admiralcompany.com/emailmarketingsuite.html

Same URL with Link Append:
http://www.admiralcompany.com/emailmarketingsuite.html?SC=GIJOE

The "GIJOE" is a unique code for this URL.  Why is this code important? It is important because you can track the number of visits, among other data, to this unique URL in Google Analytics (or other web analytics platform).  The only way someone would have gotten to the "GIJOE" URL is by clicking a link in this blog post.  

In the same way, appending a unique code for each email you send out will help you determine the traffic and activity generated by each email.

2. Reporting in Your Back End System
You may need to involve your IT department for this one, but it is worthwhile!  The goal is to know, for any "link append code," how many orders and sales dollars resulted from people who clicked your link appended URLs.

Here is what you need to say to your IT Department:
"Hello, IT. I am going to append a unique code to each URL in my promotional emails. Once our customers click a URL in the email and go to our website, please carry that unique code with the customer's order through checkout and into our back end system. My goal is to report on how many orders and sales dollars resulted from people who clicked links in any given email. Yes, I also need the order number so I can see what they purchased. Thank you."

Using the example above, if The Admiral Company sold products, we would be able to track how many orders resulted from someone who clicked the "GIJOE" URL above...and know that it came from this article.

3. Coupon Codes
They go by many names: coupon codes, key codes, promotion codes, offer codes, etc.  To put it in context, coupon codes are often used as follows:

"Order $50 or more and receive free shipping! Enter coupon code FREESHIP at checkout to receive this special offer."

The coupon code itself is irrelevant (usually they're intuitive, fun, and/or memorable), but that the code is UNIQUE is what matters.  Even if you run the same free shipping promotion several times per year, always use a unique code.

Quite often, customers save emails with special offers and try to use codes after the expiration date. Let's say your Free Shipping promotion ends next week, but three months later you receive an order with coupon code FREESHIP; you can tell the original email made a lasting impact and you have a seriously loyal customer!

4. Comparing Email Activity with Order Data
This could be the most time-consuming tactic of all, but also the most telling.  Customer behavior never ceases to amaze.

As an email marketer, let's assume you do everything to track sales!  You've:
1. Link appended every URL;
2. Ensured IT can report orders with link appended URL codes;
3. Sent a tantalizing free shipping offer with a unique coupon code

Easy to know the results, correct? Not so fast. Believe it or not, customers will receive your email -- but they may not open or click it, nor take advantage of your special offer.  Alas, they saw your email come in, went straight to your website, then placed an order.

What to do? Compare.
Generate a list of each email address that received your free shipping email. Then, after seven days (or sooner if you have to know now), run a sales report that shows you email address, order number, order date, order value, coupon code, link append code.

Then answer questions such as: how many email addresses both received the email and placed an order in the subsequent seven days?  How many email addresses did not open/click your email but placed an order in the following seven days?  How many orders/sales were tracked through the link append code vs the coupon code (and are they the same people)?

In the end...
Using all four tactics combined will give you the best idea for how your emails are performing.  But, if you're strapped for time, go with tactics 2 and 3 for "quick and dirty" reporting metrics.

If you need help implementing these tactics, call The Admiral Company!  Our email marketing suite has an easy-to-use link append feature, and our email campaign management services can help you with the reporting and analytics.

Contact us today!